


Aftermaths

by willowbough



Category: Dominic (TV)
Genre: Canonical Character Death, Gen, Guardian-Ward Relationship, Missing Scene, Points of View, Post-Canon, Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-26
Updated: 2016-04-26
Packaged: 2018-06-04 14:19:06
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 3,200
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6661933
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/willowbough/pseuds/willowbough
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In the hours between a death and a departure, alliances are both strengthened and strained, while an uncertain future awaits everyone. </p><p>Or Harriet, Lucy, Beever, and Dominic react to the events of the last three days.</p><p>Takes place between the last two scenes in Episode 8. MAJOR spoilers for the whole series.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Harriet

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Harriet, still trying to do the right thing, struggles to deal with her loss and clashes with the man she can't quite help holding partly responsible for it.

Her head ached dully and her eyes felt hot and grainy from the tears she could not—would not—let fall, not with Captain Beever’s probing gaze upon her.

A good man, a morally upright man… whom, just at this moment, Harriet wished to perdition, despite knowing that today’s tragedy was not his fault. Not wholly, anyway.

“Here it is.” She pushed back the lid of the chest. “All gold sovereigns. Grandfather’s share of the take.” Blood money—the kind that made orphans, like Dominic Bulman. 

He frowned down at the contents. “What do you mean to do with it?”

“Donate it to a charitable institution, perhaps. I want no part of it. The Staintons will no longer support the Brotherhood in any way. You have my word on that, Captain Beever.”

“You do not mean to continue Lord Stainton’s experiments, then.”

“I have not decided. If so, I will find other, more legitimate means to finance them.” Harriet paused, then chose her next words with care. “Captain, I realize that if Grandfather had survived the launch, you would have had to arrest him. That he would have had to face the consequences for leading the Brotherhood. I just wanted to—let him have this one last thing, that he’d worked on for so long…”

The captain’s keen eyes narrowed. “So you knew—or at least suspected—that the rocket might explode?”

“I… recognized that it was a possibility, yes.”

His dark brows met in a forbidding scowl. “If you hadn’t lit the fuse, Lord Stainton would be alive and in custody.”

“I know.” She swallowed bitterness before resuming evenly, “But you got what you wanted, Captain: the leader of the Brotherhood. Now permanently out of commission.”

“And by your actions, you helped him to evade the law!”

Harriet rubbed her forehead, feeling her temper rise. Damn the man: she would _not_ be browbeaten or reprimanded as though she were one of his cadets! Not after today, not after Grandfather… “Captain Beever, have you ever loved someone so much that you’d do anything for that person? Have you ever loved someone—anyone— _at all_?”

He stiffened, his stern face altering until it looked almost like a mask.

“I’m sorry!” Shocked at herself, Harriet pressed her hand to her mouth, fighting for composure. “That was… unpardonably rude of me,” she managed at last. “Pray forgive me, Captain. I was just—”

“You are grieving,” he finished for her, more gently than she would have expected, given that she must have offended him mightily. “And perhaps…I should be the one to ask pardon. Whatever else Lord Stainton was, he was your grandfather, and dear to you.”

“Thank you.” Harriet forced the words past the constriction in her throat. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I must see about fetching the undertaker.” Not that there would be much to bury. The groundskeepers had already gathered up the debris from the rocket.

“Ah.” The captain’s expression changed again. “Forgive me, Lady Harriet. I regret being the bearer of further bad tidings, but—”

“It’s Sarah, isn’t it?” _Her mother_. They would never have that conversation now…

He nodded, his face somber. “She was killed at the Eight Bells Inn, by one of Finn’s men. Before dying, she confessed all to Lady Lucy. She did not betray your grandfather’s secret, however,” he added, after a moment.

Despite the fresh pain welling within her, Harriet found it was possible to smile, just a little. “No, she wouldn’t, would she.”

“Lady Harriet—”

“Just Harriet,” she interrupted wearily. “I have no claim to any title now.”

“Harriet. I should—like to be of service to you in this, if I may.”


	2. Lucy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The woman who believed herself Barty Finn's daughter has important news to tell one of his surviving victims...

“Dead?” Nick exclaimed, staring at her. “When?”

“Since last night.” Lucy swallowed, blinked stinging eyes. “I think Scavenger shot him.”

“Lucy…” He fell silent, fretting his lower lip. “I don’t know what to say.”

“You don’t have to say nothing, Nick. An’ you don’t have to pretend you’re sorry,” she added hastily. “I know what Fa—Barty took from you. What he did to you. We both know.” 

He looked down, visibly struggling with himself. But when he looked up again, she saw compassion in his eyes. “I can’t ever be sorry for _him_ , Lucy. And I can’t share your grief. But you cared about him, even if he didn’t deserve it, so I can be sorry for _you_. I don’t even have to pretend.”

“Oh, Nick…” Tears rose in her eyes, in her throat, and she swallowed again. What a _good_ lad he was, honest and true—she could never regret saving him. The one brave thing she’d done in her life. “Don’t know how you can look at me sometimes,” she choked out. The daughter of the man who’d killed his parents…

“Lucy, do you think I could ever blame you, for what _he_ did? You saved my life.” He hesitated, then reached out, a little shyly, and took her hand. His own was warm, with calluses she hadn’t expected across the palm: a gentleman’s hand, but a sailor’s too. “I can’t begin to repay the debt. But if you should ever need _anything_ —well, I’m yours to command.”


	3. Beever

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Captain Beever contemplates the collateral damage left by the Brotherhood, and reflects, not altogether happily, on his own role in recent events.

_Have you ever loved someone at all?_

The words had stung, when Beever first heard them. Now they worked their insidious way under his skin, burning like shell fragments, as he made his way downstairs.

_You got what you wanted: the leader of the Brotherhood. Now permanently out of commission._

In his mind’s eye, he saw the rocket ascend, then explode, raining fiery debris upon the earth below. And Harriet turning away to hide her face against Dominic’s shoulder.

Beever’s stomach roiled at the memory, and he had to stop to brace himself against the nearest wall until the nausea subsided. He hadn’t felt this queasy since he was a raw midshipman weathering a storm at sea.

_You got what you wanted._

_No, Harriet—I did not._

He’d wanted Lord Stainton brought to account, not blown to kingdom come. Wanted the Brotherhood dismantled, or severely crippled at least. Wanted to strike a lasting blow against corruption and cowardice.

Fine sentiments and lofty aims…but when the dust had settled, there was still the human cost to be counted. So many lives lost, and three young people—Dominic, Lucy, and Harriet—who’d had their worlds upended or torn apart by the greedy and selfish agendas of others. Who needed comfort that he felt ill-equipped to give. And Harriet in particular was unlikely to want any comfort from _him_.

He was not accustomed to feeling inadequate. It was an uncomfortable sensation, like stinging nettles against his skin. And Harriet’s question had disconcerted him greatly. Did she really think him so unfeeling? Did the whole world then see him as nothing more than cold or harsh?

Well, if he could not say anything to offer comfort, there was still something he could _do_ —and he’d given his word to do it.

He descended the remaining stairs, then paused, listening as voices from the drawing room drifted out to him: Lucy and Dominic.

“—saved my life,” the boy was saying earnestly. “I can’t begin to repay the debt.”

Nor could Beever. At odd moments, he found himself haunted by images of those iron rings dangling from the rocks, washed by the ceaseless tide. He quickened his pace, trying to put that memory, along with today’s, behind him.

“Yours to command.” 

The boy again, speaking in such a decisive tone that Beever’s curiosity was piqued. Reaching the drawing room, he peered inside.

They stood before the fireplace, Dominic holding Lucy’s hand, and Beever saw in his ward’s face the same unswerving dedication he’d shown last night when he’d stated his resolve to bring his parents’ killers to justice. Lucy might doubt her place in the world, but she need not doubt Dominic’s loyalty: absolute for her, as it was for his parents and Bessie Dearlove.

Constant as the North Star. It would be something, Beever thought, to win this boy’s whole-hearted allegiance; he wondered if _he_ ever would.

As though sensing his presence, they both turned, almost in unison, towards the doorway.

Dominic released Lucy’s hand—completely without self-consciousness, Beever observed—and stood at attention. “Captain Beever, sir.” 

“At ease, Mr. Bulman,” he acknowledged, coming further into the room.

“Captain Beever, where’s Lady Harriet?” Lucy asked, gazing at him with anxious eyes.

“Still in Lord Stainton’s study. I’ve broken the news to her—about Miss Sarah.”

“You should go to her, Lucy,” Dominic urged. “She needs you now.”

The girl hesitated, then gave a quick nod. “Don’t know if I’ll be of any use, but you’re right, Nick. She shouldn’t be alone.”

Watching her go, Beever couldn’t help but wonder how the Stainton ladies would cope with the changes thrust upon them. But Dominic must be _his_ chief concern. His to protect and comfort, even if he wasn’t sure how to accomplish the latter.

“Sir,” the boy began now, “Lucy told me that Barty Finn died. Last night at the Eight Bells Inn.”

“Yes. Forgive me for not telling you earlier. I believe he was killed by Scavenger, another of his ‘bully boys,’ whom I suspect robbed your parents’ coach, along with Nat. Both are now dead,” Beever added before the boy could speak. “Which means, Nick, that the men most directly responsible for your parents’ murders are themselves no longer living.”

Dominic bit his lip. “I swore an oath to bring their killers to justice. But they all seem to have eliminated each other instead.”

Beever himself had shot Nat, but he felt disinclined to share that information as yet. “Then they are no longer on your conscience. Justice, albeit of a rough and ready nature, has been done.”

The boy’s gaze was still troubled. “Has it really, sir?”

Beever sighed. “Barty Finn can do no further harm, Nick—to you or anyone else. I consider that justice enough. He was an evil man who did evil things and met an evil end, though I would not have said so in front of Lucy. I wish I could tell you to think no more on him, but I know you will likely have to, when you give evidence at the assizes. If Mr. Jenkins and your fellow cadets succeeded in apprehending Mr. Wardle, it’s possible he could be tried as early as September.” 

Along with anyone else the bailiff could point his finger at, hoping to save his own skin. And Beever had promised to do what he could for the hapless Jimmy Bells, too timid and incompetent to be considered a true villain. They’d left him tied up at the church for his own safety, but by now he must surely have been found and taken into custody as well.

“September,” Dominic echoed. “It seems a long way off.”

No doubt it did, when the boy must live every day now without the parents he loved. “The days will pass soon enough,” Beever said, more gently than was his usual wont. “Meanwhile, you’ll have time to prepare yourself for the trial.”

“Yes, sir.” He paused, fretting his lip again. “Captain Beever, what do you think will happen with the Brotherhood, now that Lord Stainton’s dead?”

“I don’t know, Nick. His death leaves them without a leader for now. Unfortunately, I suspect they’ll find someone to replace him soon enough.” Corruption was _not_ so easily stamped out, especially in such times as these. “It won’t be Lady Harriet, however. She assures me that she wants nothing to do with smugglers, and that the Staintons will no longer support them.”

“It must have been hard for her, finding out about her grandfather.” 

“Very.” The word came out clipped and curt. _You got what you wanted._

“And he wasn’t a cold-blooded murderer, was he, sir? Not like Finn. Just selfish—and blinkered, about anything not immediately related to his own interests.”

The shrewdness of that assessment had Beever taking a closer look at his ward, who continued somberly, “You said that the leader of the Brotherhood was like a bad captain, corrupting his whole crew. With respect, sir—I think Lord Stainton was more like a man with a vicious dog he refused to control. He didn’t care how many sheep it killed or how many people it attacked, so long as he continued to profit from it somehow.”

“An apt comparison,” Beever conceded, after a moment. “Sometimes willful obliviousness can cause as much damage as active malice. To say nothing of ruthless self-interest.” Apropos of which…

“I came to request your assistance, Mr. Bulman,” he said, recalling his errand and resuming his military demeanor. “On a somewhat sensitive matter.”

“Sir.” Dominic drew himself to attention again. 

“I told Lady Harriet that we’d arrange transport, to bring Miss Sarah home.” Scavenger could rot where he lay for all Beever cared, but he knew that Harriet would want Miss Sarah here, at Castle Stainton, in spite of her sins. “Her—remains are still at the Eight Bells.”

“Miss Sarah and Lord Stainton on the same day.” The boy shook his head dazedly. “It’s like a Greek tragedy, with all the bodies piled onstage in the last act.”

And Dominic’s parents had been the first to fall. Something else about which Beever could perhaps have been a little kinder. And certainly more patient.

“Are you all right, boy?” he asked abruptly.

Dominic blinked, taken aback by the question. “I’ll…I’ll do, sir. For now.”

“You handled yourself well, in the field today. Just as an officer should.”

The boy’s eyes widened. “Thank you, sir.” He paused, a faint crease between his brows as he studied Beever. “Are—are _you_ all right, sir?”

The human touch. The concern for individuals. Charles had had it—it should come as no surprise that his son did too. The discovery sent a pang that was half-painful, half-reassuring through him.

Beever took a breath before replying. “Well enough, Mr. Bulman. But it has been a long day—and a difficult one, for us all. Let us go and speak to the grooms about a carriage.”


	4. Dominic

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ending where it all began, with a boy, a gold watch, and a promise.
> 
> Takes place immediately post-canon, with Dominic and Beever preparing to depart Castle Stainton.

Even in the gathering dusk, the watch shone like a sun in Nick’s hand, pure burnished gold.

Only metal, though. Not brighter than his mother’s smile. Nor more precious than the touch of his father’s hand on his shoulder. Treasures that cast this trinket wholly in the shade…

Beever, standing beside him in the courtyard, cleared his throat. “So, according to Lucy, the watch held a special meaning for you.”

Nick exhaled. “It meant a lot of things to many people, sir, as we discovered.” 

Power. Wealth. Advancement. Security. A reason to murder and betray.

“But to you, in particular?” the captain persisted.

“It started as evidence, sir—the first clue to my parents’ murders. Beyond that, it represents a promise, I suppose. And a pledge. I swore on it that I would find their killers, if it took me the rest of my life.” 

Standing on the moors, the hunter held tight in his fist, making his oath and meaning it with every fragment of his broken heart. Had it really been only three days ago? It seemed a lifetime since then.

“Like a holy relic,” Beever said softly. “Or a cross.”

Nick looked down, slightly uncomfortable with the comparison. “Something like that, sir.”

They stood in silence, their thoughts running along what Nick suspected were similar tracks. So many dead, all to possess what he now held in his hand, freely given to him by Lucy.

Beever broke the silence at last. “Yours was the only unselfish motive in seeking it, Nick. And you kept faith, which is a rare and admirable thing. So it seems only fitting that you should be the final possessor.”

“But it’s caused so much trouble, sir. So much tragedy. I can't help thinking it might have been better if the watch had been lost at the bottom of the Channel. If no one had ever seen it again.” His parents, certainly, caught up in events that they barely understood and who had paid the ultimate price for it. 

Beever sighed. “One cannot deal in ‘what-ifs,’ boy, only in ‘what is.’ Otherwise, you run the risk of driving yourself mad.”

He sounded tired, almost subdued. And he looked as tired as he sounded, as well as older than Nick had ever seen him. But then, he’d watched three people die before sunset, the boy remembered. The day had indeed taken a toll on them all.

“Lord Stainton gave the watch to his son on his wedding day,” Beever continued. “So at the very beginning, it was a gift of love. Perhaps you should think of it that way too: as a symbol of your love for your parents, and theirs for you.”

Strange to hear Captain Beever, of all people, talking about love, Nick mused. But he couldn’t dispute the point. It had been love—love and grief—for his parents that had led him on this perilous adventure. And if the conclusion had turned out differently than he’d expected, at least he’d lived to tell the tale. And to keep their dear memories alive.

“Love—and friendship,” Beever added. “Yours and Lucy’s.”

 _Lucy_. The thought of her sent a little eddy of warmth about Nick’s heart. Lucy, who wished him only good things—as he wished the same for her. And who was indelibly etched upon his memory, just as his parents were.

Straightening to his full height, he took a deep breath. “Let it end in love, then.” 

_Let it end._

He slipped the hunter into his pocket, then felt a hand descend, almost tentatively, upon his shoulder, as if its owner weren’t sure whether the gesture would be accepted or rejected.

“Nick,” Beever began, his voice quieter than usual, “I realize that we—have not had the best beginning, as guardian and ward. I hope that we can do better, from this point on.”

Could they? Nick wondered. They’d managed to come together in a common cause, but what of day to day living? He neither sought nor desired to be set apart from his fellow cadets, but there _would_ be times when he and his guardian were thrown back on each other’s company. Would they be able to hold on to the new understanding they were forging now? Or would they find themselves at odds again, unable to reconcile their very different temperaments?

Nick knew which outcome he would prefer, though it would take time and effort on both their parts. But Beever’s even broaching the subject seemed an auspicious sign. Perhaps they could manage it, after all. At the very least, it was something to strive for.

“I would like that too, sir,” he said at last, and despite the deepening shadows, he thought he saw the faintest softening about his guardian’s eyes and mouth.

Horse’s hooves clip-clopped over the paving stones, and they looked up to see one of the Stainton grooms approaching, leading the captain’s big grey.

Cloak billowing in the breeze, Beever strode towards his horse. “Come, boy—time we were away.”

“Yes, sir,” Nick agreed, falling into step behind him.

**Author's Note:**

> Call this story a prelude to Future Fic. Because while the big adventure concludes and the big mystery is solved, there is a ton of emotional fall-out in _Dominic_ that has yet to be addressed. Unlike _Boy Dominic_ , which ties things off neatly with a feel-good ending, the sequel leaves a question mark hanging over the fates of many of the main characters, and the tone of the conclusion is ambiguous at best. 
> 
> Quite simply, there needs to be an Act Three. And eventually, there will be--my take on it, anyway.


End file.
